Morning Briefing

Strange Didn't Know History and Relived It

Curtis Strange insists he would try the same shots again, but Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post advises him to check first with Billy Joe Patton, the amateur who blew the 1954 Masters and now serves as an official at Augusta National.

On Sunday, Strange came to the 13th hole with a three-shot lead. Last year, Ben Crenshaw came to the same hole with a two-shot lead.

Boswell: "After a perfect drive, Crenshaw took out a wood to try to reach the par-5 in two shots. Before he swung, Crenshaw looked for his father in the gallery. Instead, he saw Billy Joe Patton. Instantly, Crenshaw put the wood back in his bag.

" 'I figured somebody was trying to tell me something,' Crenshaw said then. Patton, leading the 1954 Masters, gambled at both the 13th and 15th holes, went in the water twice and made a 7 and a 6. By one shot, he missed a playoff with Sam Snead and Ben Hogan, and Snead went on to win.

"With the past as prologue, Crenshaw laid up safely at both the 13th and the 500-yard 15th, made a par and a birdie, and won by two shots."

On Sunday, Strange tried to make both greens in two and went the Billy Joe Patton route. He lost by two shots.

Does Strange remember Patton's collapse.

"That was the year before I was born," he said. "I don't remember it too well."

Said Gary Carter of the New York Mets after hitting his third game-winning homer Sunday: "It's like a dream. In all the years I played in Montreal, I remember only one curtain call, when I hit three home runs in one game. And we lost the game. I've had three curtain calls already this week. New York, New York. I love it."

How-times-have-changed dept.: From Tom Lasorda: "I did a commercial last year for a major beverage company that paid me more money for three hours work than I earned during my first 10 years in minor league baseball."

From Jimmy Bryan, who covers the Birmingham Stallions for the Birmingham News: "I was covering the World Football League when it folded. I was covering the World Hockey Assn. when it folded. I was covering the South Atlantic Hockey League team here when it folded after two games. I am now covering the USFL. I think I'm making the Stallions nervous. Commissioner Boyd McWhorter once asked me not to cover the Southeastern Conference. I think he was kidding."

John Kelley, winner of the 1957 Boston Marathon, couldn't run this year because of illness. The family was covered, however. His 77-year-old father, also John Kelley, competed for the 54th time.

The elder Kelley, a two-time winner, covered the 26.2 miles in 4 hours 31 minutes.

"I'm not fast anymore," he said, "but I can shake a leg and beat a lot of them."

From Boston pitcher Dennis (Oil Can) Boyd after his second victory of the season: "I was mixing them up. I kept the ball coming from a different perception (sic) all day."

Where They Are Now: Freeman Williams, the former Manual Arts and Portland State gunner, scored 47 points to lead the Tampa Bay Thrillers to a 109-105 win over the Detroit Spirits in the seventh and deciding game of the Continental Basketball Assn. playoffs.

Sinking two free throws to clinch the win was Sidney Lowe, a guard on the North Carolina State team that won the NCAA title in 1982-83.

Quotebook

Frank Layden, coach of the Utah Jazz: "Utah is largely Republican, but I'm not a member of any organized political party. I'm a Democrat."